The
Mshkodésik ("People of the Small Prairie") division of the Potawatomi were originally located around the southern portions of
Lake Michigan, in what today is southern
Wisconsin, northern
Illinois and northwestern
Indiana. Due to their name in the
Potawatomi language, the
Mshkodésik were often confused with another tribe, the
Mascoutens. As part of the
Council of Three Fires, the Prairie Band were signatories to the 1829
Second Treaty of Prairie du Chien (). Independently of the Council of Three Fires, the Prairie Band were also signatories to the 1832
Treaty of Tippecanoe () as the
Potawatomi Tribe of Indians of the Prairie. In the 1830s, Chief
Shab-eh-nay, the leader of tribal residents on of land in Illinois, went to visit members of his family who had been forced west to Kansas. While he was gone, the United States seized the property and auctioned it off to others. Under the
Indian Removal Act, the Prairie Band were forcibly relocated west, first to
Missouri's Platte County in the mid-1830s and then to the vicinity of
Council Bluffs, Iowa, in the 1840s, where they were known as the
Bluff Indians. The tribe controlled up to five million acres (20,000 km2) at both locations. After 1846, the tribe moved to present-day Kansas. At that time, the reservation was thirty square miles which included part of present-day
Topeka. During the period from the 1940s - 1960s, in which the
Indian termination policy was enforced, four
Kansas tribes, including the Potawatomi, were targeted for termination. One of the first pieces of legislation enacted during this period was the
Kansas Act of 1940 which transferred all jurisdiction for crimes committed on or against Indians from federal jurisdiction to the state of Kansas. It did not preclude the federal government from trying native people, but it allowed the state into an area of law in which had historically belonged only to the federal government. On August 1, 1953, the
US Congress passed
House Concurrent Resolution 108 which called for the immediate termination of the
Flathead,
Klamath,
Menominee,
Potawatomi, and
Turtle Mountain Chippewa, as well as all tribes in the states of
California,
New York,
Florida, and
Texas. Termination of a tribe meant the immediate withdrawal of all federal aid, services, and protection, as well as the end of reservations. A memo issued by the
Department of the Interior on January 21, 1954, clarified that the reference to "Potawatomi" in the Resolution meant the Prairie Band of Potawatomi Nation, the
Kickapoo, the
Sac and Fox and the
Iowa tribes in Kansas. Because jurisdiction over criminal matters had already been transferred to the state of Kansas by the passage of the
Kansas Act of 1940, the government targeted the four tribes in Kansas for immediate termination. The Prairie Band of Potawatomi Nation tribal leader,
Minnie Evans (Potawatomi: Ke-what-no-quah Wish-Ken-O) led the effort to stop termination. Tribal members sent petitions of protest to the government and multiple delegations went to testify at congressional meetings in Washington, DC. Tribal Council members Vestana Cadue, Oliver Kahbeah, and Ralph Simon of the
Kickapoo Tribe in Kansas traveled at their own expense to testify as well. The strong opposition from the Potawatomi and Kickapoo tribes helped them, as well as the Sac and Fox and the Iowa Tribe, avoid termination. In May 1997, the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation broke ground on the construction of the
Prairie Band Casino & Resort to generate revenue for the tribe. The establishment opened on January 12, 1998, under the management of
Harrah's Entertainment (an outside commercial entity). Tribal management subsequently assumed control of the establishment in July 2007. The tribe purchased a corner of the original reservation in
DeKalb County, Illinois, in 2006 and leased the land for farming. The
United States Department of the Interior formally placed the into trust for the benefit of the tribal band in 2024, thereby giving the Prairie Band tribal sovereignty over the land. The Prairie Band Potawatomi became the first and only
federally recognized tribal nation in
Illinois, since Native Americans were dispossessed in the 19th century. On March 21, 2025, Illinois Governor
JB Pritzker signed legislation authorizing the transfer of ownership of
Shabbona Lake State Park to the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation. ==Government==